Antireflective grassy surface on glass substrates with self-masked dry etching

Young Min Song,Gyeong Cheol Park,Chan Il Yeo,Yong Tak Lee,Eun Kyu Kang

doi:10.1186/1556-276x-8-505

Young Min Song, Gyeong Cheol Park + Show 3 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1186/1556-276x-8-505

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Abstract

Although recently developed bio-inspired nanostructures exhibit superior optic performance, their practical applications are limited due to cost issues. We present highly transparent glasses with grassy surface fabricated with self-masked dry etch process. Simultaneously generated nanoclusters during reactive ion etch process with simple gas mixture (i.e., CF4/O2) enables lithography-free, one-step nanostructure fabrication. The resulting grassy surfaces, composed of tapered subwavelength structures, exhibit antireflective (AR) properties in 300 to 1,800-nm wavelength ranges as well as improved hydrophilicity for antifogging. Rigorous coupled-wave analysis calculation provides design guidelines for AR surface on glass substrates.

Highlights

Antireflective (AR) coatings/structures are needed for most of existing optical components and optoelectronic devices, ranging from glasses, polymers, and fibers to solar cells, photodetectors, light-emitting diodes, and laser diodes, to remove undesired optical loss and improve optical performance [1,2,3]
For advanced AR properties compared to the conventional AR coatings, subwavelength structures (SWSs) with tapered profile, which is inspired by insect's eye, have been developed [4,5,6]
We present a simple, fast, and cost-effective method for fabricating AR grassy surfaces composed of tapered SWSs on glass substrates

Summary

Introduction

Antireflective (AR) coatings/structures are needed for most of existing optical components and optoelectronic devices, ranging from glasses, polymers, and fibers to solar cells, photodetectors, light-emitting diodes, and laser diodes, to remove undesired optical loss and improve optical performance [1,2,3]. There are a variety of fabrication processes for AR SWSs, such as electron-beam or laser interference lithography, nanoimprint lithography, nanosphere or colloid formation, metal nanoparticles, and Langmuir-Blodgett assembly [5,6,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15]. These techniques are still expensive, time consuming, and sophisticated, which block the

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